Colorado adventure 2

Howdy Bloggers.
Little Fox here.  I made it to our first stop in Colorado.  This fox is staying with friends in Carbondale, Colorado.  One of the day trips we took was up the road to Redstone Colorado.  Redstone was a company town.  It was a model company town.  The owner of the mine treated his employees very well.  Excellent food.  Schools for the kids.  Safe(r) working conditions in the mines.  Recreation for the miners after work.

Redstone was established for coal mining.  So why am I in front of a marble statue?  Well, there is a town called Marble Colorado a few miles up the road.  Marble has a pretty important quarry for US based stuffies.  The marble used in the Lincoln Memorial and the tomb of the unknown solider came from Marble, Colorado. 

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A store that advertises ice cream. I think I should explore this place for sure. 

Sigh. No ice cream but I did see this cool antique store.

I really like this "Big Boy" statue.....that is until I saw that they wanted $859.00 for it.  Whew, this fox doesn't carry that kind of cash around.

I did meet a nice goat family.

Redstone was known for the coal mines.  These are coke ovens (and during the height of mining they had oven 200 coke ovens).  These are used to refine the coal (I assume).  The steel was stripped from the ovens during World War II for the army. 

 These ovens are very unique.  There are only a few ovens like this left in the West.  Redstone is one of the few places you can still see these ovens.

A little walk along the river led me to the Redstone Inn. 

 The Redstone Inn is a fancy hotel but it was actually built as a dormitory for the single miners in Redstone, Colorado. I hope they have a restaurant. I'm hungry.

They do have a restaurant but I have to wait a few minutes while they get a table for me and my gang.  Perhaps I have time to learn how to place chess?